Google Wins Dismissal of Book-Scanning Suit

Google on Thursday won a major victory in its long-running battle with the publishing industry over the company’s right to scan tens of millions of books.

A federal judge in New York dismissed a lawsuit brought by an author’s group that charged the company with copyright infringement over its massive digital copying effort.

U.S. Circuit Judge Denny Chin said that while Google didn’t obtain permission from copyright holders to scan their works, those concerns were outweighed by other factors, and that Google’s efforts represented “fair use” of the material, under copyright law.

The judge said Google Books allows scholars to analyze massive amounts of data, preserves and expands access to books, generates new audiences, and creates new sources of income for authors and publishers. “In my view, Google Books provides significant public benefits,” he wrote.

Judge Chin also noted that Google takes security measures to prevent people from viewing a complete copy of a ‘snippet-view’ book.

The Authors Guild said that it will appeal the decision. “We disagree with and are disappointed by the court’s decision today,” said Paul Aiken, executive director, in a statement. “Google made unauthorized digital editions of nearly all of the world’s valuable copyright-protected literature and profits from displaying those works. In our view, such mass digitization and exploitation far exceeds the bounds of the fair use defense.”

In an email, a spokesperson for Google said, “This has been a long road and we are absolutely delighted with today’s judgment. As we have long said Google Books is in compliance with copyright law and acts like a card catalog for the digital age giving users the ability to find books to buy or borrow.”

Google has scanned more than 20 million books since 2004 when it struck an agreement with several major research libraries to digitally copy their collections, according to court papers. The company stood to lose billions of dollars if it lost the case. Under copyright law, the minimum statutory damages for infringement is $750 per infringed work.

The ruling is significant in part because Judge Chin found that the Google’s book scanning created a service that was transformational and benefitted all of society, said Corynne McSherry, the intellectual property director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The digital civil liberties group, which focuses on fair use and digital rights online, earlier filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Google. “This was about making a book searchable online and enabling users to discover books that they might not have known about otherwise,” said Ms. McSherry.

The lawsuit dates back to 2005, when the Authors Guild, which represents published writers, filed a suit that alleged “massive copyright infringement” by Google. Soon afterwards, the Association of American Publishers also filed suit on behalf of five major publishers, in an attempt to prevent Google from copying books within copyright.

A settlement was reached in 2008, only to have Judge Chin later reject it because he felt that the agreement didn’t represent the interests of all copyright owners. He was also concerned that the settlement gave Google a “significant advantage” over its rivals. In late 2012, the publishers group settled with Google, striking a deal that allowed Google to scan library books but also allowed publishers to remove digitized titles if they wanted.

One of the plaintiffs in the Authors Guild suit was Jim Bouton, a former pitcher for the New York Yankees and author of the book “Ball Four.”